Richard Rohr Quotes
A person who can laugh and go with life does not demand to be in control, which is why the most controlling people may be sarcastic but lack an authentic sense of humor.
Much of what is called Christianity has more to do with disguising the ego behind the screen of religion and culture than any real movement toward a God beyond the small self, and a new self in God.
Until we learn to love others as ourselves, it's difficult to blame broken people who desperately try to affirm themselves when no one else will.
The Gospel gives human suffering deep, personal, and cosmic meaning, by connecting our pain to the pain of others and, finally, by connecting us to the very "pain of God".
Jesus is never upset at sinners; he is only upset with people who do not think they are sinners.
We are just a little tiny flicker of a much larger flame that is Life itself, Consciousness itself, Being itself, Love itself, God’s very self.
I think your heart needs to be broken, and broken open, at least once to have a heart at all or to have a heart for others.
Life is not, nor ever has been, a straight line forward ... Life is characterized much more by exception and disorder than by total or perfect order.
The greatest enemy of ordinary daily goodness and joy is not imperfection, but the demand for some supposed perfection or order.
Pope Francis insists that mercy is at the very top of the Christian hierarchy of great truths, and everything falls apart whenever mercy is displaced by anything else.
Remember finally, that the ashes that were on your forehead are created from the burnt palms of last Palm Sunday. New beginnings invariably come from old false things that are allowed to die.
If you depend on being emotionally inspired or newly motivated, you will need a new fix almost every day.
Faith is not a means to something further. It is not something we do in order to get to heaven. Faith is its own end. To have faith is already to have come alive.
Whole people see and create wholeness wherever they go; split people see and create splits in everything and everybody.
Our job as conscious humans is to bring the beauty and goodness of everything to full consciousness, to full delight, to full awareness.
Metaphor is the only possible language available to religion because it alone is honest about Mystery.
...religion either produces the very best people or the very worst.
When 'happiness' eludes us - as, eventually, it always will - we have the invitation to examine our programmed responses and to exercise our power to choose again.
Your heart has to be prepared ahead of time through faith and prayer and grace and mercy and love and forgiveness so you can keep your heart open in hell, when hell happens.
Contemplation is an alternative consciousness that refuses to identify with or feed what are only passing shows. It is the absolute opposite of addiction, consumerism or any egoic consciousness.
The gift of darkness draws you to know God’s presence beyond what thought, imagination, or sensory feeling can comprehend.
Once God and grace move us to the second half of life, religion becomes a mystical matter, rather than a moral matter.
In terms of soul work, we dare not get rid of the pain before we have learned what it has to teach us.
The more one gives one's self in creative union with another, the more one becomes one's self.
Our job as humans is to make admiration of others and adoration of God fully conscious and deliberate.
The Gospel is not a fire insurance policy for the next world, but a life assurance policy for this world.
One wonders how far spiritual and political leaders can genuinely lead us without some degree of mystical seeing and action.
Those who are not true leaders will just affirm people at their own immature level.
God created us for love, for union, for forgiveness and compassion and, yet, that has not been our storyline. That has not been our history.
God, give me a good humiliation every day. It's good for the soul and it's good for the ego.
After 32 years as a priest , I think its fair to say that most institutional churches are very limited in addressing higher levels of spiritual consciousness.
To the degree you have experienced intimacy with God, you won’t be afraid of death because you’re experiencing the first tastes and promises of heaven in this world.
The ego hates losing – even to God.
The movement toward gratitude, authenticity, and union is the natural and organic inner work of the second half of our lives.
People who know how to creatively break the rules also know why the rules were there in the first place.
Much of the work of midlife is to tell the difference between those who are dealing with their issues through you and those who are really dealing with you.